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The UK release of the film has been censored by Disney - warning, spoilers!

Further Details:
Early reports indicated - and I can now confirm - that the UK release of Avengers Assemble has been censored. For reasons best known to themselves, Disney has digitally removed the sight of Loki's sceptre protruding from the chest of Agent Coulson after he is stabbed, as seen below.

In the edited scene the sceptre has been digitally removed, like so. Curiously, the next shot sees Coulson head on with a blood soaked stain on the front of his shirt.

The BBFC passed the film uncut at '12A' in the UK and as the home rating of '12' is essentially the same thing absolutely no change would have been required for the Blu-ray and DVD release. This puzzling turn of events has been made even more so by Disney's insistence that the UK release of the film never included a visible shot of the sceptre, in spite of many people claiming to have seen it at their local cinemas.

When coupled with the omission of some of the extras from the US release (including a Joss Whedon commentary track), the recent use of DTS-HD High Resolution instead of Master Audio on John Carter, and numerous titles receiving inferior releases in the UK (the US release of The Incredibles was four discs, the UK got one with fewer extras than the old DVD), one could easily be forgiven for thinking that Disney has something against the UK market.

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That's absolute rubbish. This is the only digital censoring, so whoever is spreading those rumours is an idiot. However, while it may not look like much above that's just a single frame. It's obviously more noticeable in the film, especially if you saw it theatrically.

The other thing to bear in mind is that the UK BD is missing the Joss Whedon commentary track.

So what else is cut from the film in this UK Blu ray version, as everything I'm hearing is deterring me from buying this film, and I'm not sure if the USA version will work on my UK player. If its just the shot of the spear in his chest i couldn't care less, but I heard about 10 minutes worth was cut and replaced noticeably. Can anyone help?

With various different version kicking about for different territories, it's hardly surprising this sort of thing happens. If the spear tip is the only difference, it's easy to see why it might not have been picked up on earlier. The fact that Disney claimed it was the the same as the theatrical version when it was a simple matter of checking the BBFC website to confirm otherwise, kind of suggest they (the spokesperson at least) were unaware of the gaff. To make that sort of false statement knowingly, in the full knowledge that you'd likely be challenged on it, would be a bit of a bluff too far. May have to chalk this one up to human error.

Pain in the hole though. Don't think I'll be returning mine though (unless they put in motion a fixed disc pronto) as the alteration doesn't really bother me. I'll just hope they maybe release a fixed version with commentary and more extras further down the line. Plus, in returning the UKBD that I bought, I'd potentially have to give up the disc 2 Marvel documentary as they might not offer Avengers up again with that exclusive disc.

You could argue that the spear tip hasn't been censored or removed. As a CGI element, it was never physically there in the first place. What we have here is a version of the film that omits a CGI effect.

Also, given the design of the spear, it probably wouldn't have protruded that far out anyway. Not defending the tweaking of this film (or any other for that matter) just not sure that the lack of sight of a spear tip wrecks the film as a whole.

Agreed, that the UKBD is extras 'lite'. The Sainsbury's exclusive disc with the Marvel documentary makes up for some of the shortfall but leaving the commentary off is disappointing.

The same "censored" version was released in Germany and some other countries. This got some attention in Germany two weeks ago and Disney released a statement that this was the version shown theatrically in "numerous contries worldwide, including Germany, Austria and Switzerland". Since the German steelbook seems to be the only way to get the Target bonus disc, I made my peace with it. If this had been changed for the MPAA rating, it wouldn't even get mentioned in the audio commentary, I bet.

"After there has been some commotion on the net about a slightly changed short scene in 'Marvel's The Avengers' Disney themselves addressed the topic and released a statement, first via Facebook and later on amazon.de:

'The DVD and Blu-ray of Marvel's The Avengers that is being released in Germany, Austria and Switzerland contains the same version of the film that was shown in theatres. During the production of the movie two version were created which differ in a single visual sequence. It concerns a scene in which a person is stabbed to death. One version shows the lance fully penetrating the body, the other version omits this detail. This has no effect on the length of the film. In numerous contries worldwide, including Germany, Austria and Switzerland, the movie was shown theatrically without this close-up. Otherwise, both versions are completely identical. No changes have been made for the DVD an Blu-ray release of the film.'"

Disney's insistence that the scene never appeared on cinema screens as we all remember it is insulting at best. The BBFC classification for the film in April even refers to the scene in question -

"A slightly stronger moment occurs when a man is stabbed through the back by the chief villain's spear. The detail of the impact is not shown, only the tip of the spear protruding from the man's chest with a small amount of blood on it. The image is not dwelt upon and serves an important narrative purpose."